Sultanate of Damagaram
Encyclopedia
Niger
Niger , officially named the Republic of Niger, is a landlocked country in Western Africa, named after the Niger River. It borders Nigeria and Benin to the south, Burkina Faso and Mali to the west, Algeria and Libya to the north and Chad to the east...
, centered on the city of Zinder
Zinder
Zinder is the second largest city in Niger, with a population of 170,574 by 2005 was estimated to be over 200,000...
.
Rise
The Sultanate of Damagaram was founded in 1731 (near Myrria, modern Niger) by MuslimMuslim
A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...
Kanouri aristocrats, led by Mallam (r. 1736–1743). Damagaram was technically a vassal state of the decaying Kanem-Bornu Empire
Kanem-Bornu Empire
The Kanem-Bornu Empire existed in modern Chad and Nigeria. It was known to the Arabian geographers as the Kanem Empire from the 9th century AD onward and lasted as the independent kingdom of Bornu until 1900. At its height it encompassed an area covering not only much of Chad, but also parts of...
, but quickly came to conquer all its fellow vassal states of western Bornu. In the 1830s, the small band of Bornu nobles and retainers conquered the Myrria kingdom, the Sassebaki sultanates (including Zinder). By the 19th century, Damagaram had absorbed 18 Bornu vassal states in the area.
Zinder rose from a small Hausa village to an important center of the Trans-Saharan trade
Trans-Saharan trade
Trans-Saharan trade requires travel across the Sahara to reach sub-Saharan Africa. While existing from prehistoric times, the peak of trade extended from the 8th century until the late 16th century.- Increasing desertification and economic incentive :...
with the moving of the capital of Damagaram there in 1736. The large fortress of the southeast central city (Birini) was built shortly thereafter, and became a major hub for trade south through Kano
Kano
Kano is a city in Nigeria and the capital of Kano State in Northern Nigeria. Its metropolitan population is the second largest in Nigeria after Lagos. The Kano Urban area covers 137 sq.km and comprises six Local Government Area - Kano Municipal, Fagge, Dala, Gwale, Tarauni and Nassarawa - with a...
and east to Bornu
Bornu
Bornu may refer to:* Bornu Empire, a historical state of West Africa* Borno State, Nigeria...
. The Tuareg encampments and trade houses of the Hausa town (Zengou) expanded with this trade.
Apex
Damagaram had a mixed relationship with the other major regional power, the Sokoto Caliphate to the south. While it provided aid to the animist Hausa led refugee states to its west (in what is now Niger) who were formed from the rump of the states conquered by the Sokoto Caliph, Damagaram also maintained good relations with its southern neighbors. Damagaram sat astride the major trade route linking TripoliTripoli
Tripoli is the capital and largest city in Libya. It is also known as Western Tripoli , to distinguish it from Tripoli, Lebanon. It is affectionately called The Mermaid of the Mediterranean , describing its turquoise waters and its whitewashed buildings. Tripoli is a Greek name that means "Three...
to Kano
Kano
Kano is a city in Nigeria and the capital of Kano State in Northern Nigeria. Its metropolitan population is the second largest in Nigeria after Lagos. The Kano Urban area covers 137 sq.km and comprises six Local Government Area - Kano Municipal, Fagge, Dala, Gwale, Tarauni and Nassarawa - with a...
, one of the more powerful Sokoto sultanates, which provided the economic lifeblood of both states. An east west trade from the Niger River
Niger River
The Niger River is the principal river of western Africa, extending about . Its drainage basin is in area. Its source is in the Guinea Highlands in southeastern Guinea...
to Bornu also passed through Zinder, making relations with animist neighbors like Maradi or the Gobirwa as profitable, and thus important. Damagaram also covered some of the more productive of Bornu's western salt producing evaporation mines, as well as farms producing Ostrich feathers, highly valued in Europe.
In the mid 19th century, European travelers estimated the state covered some 70,000 square kilometers and had a population over 400,000, mostly Hausa
Hausa people
The Hausa are one of the largest ethnic groups in West Africa. They are a Sahelian people chiefly located in northern Nigeria and southeastern Niger, but having significant numbers living in regions of Cameroon, Ghana, Cote d'Ivoire, Chad and Sudan...
, but also Tuareg, Fula
Fula people
Fula people or Fulani or Fulbe are an ethnic group spread over many countries, predominantly in West Africa, but found also in Central Africa and Sudanese North Africa...
, Kanuri, Arab
Arab
Arab people, also known as Arabs , are a panethnicity primarily living in the Arab world, which is located in Western Asia and North Africa. They are identified as such on one or more of genealogical, linguistic, or cultural grounds, with tribal affiliations, and intra-tribal relationships playing...
and Toubou
Toubou
The Tubu are an ethnic group that live mainly in northern Chad, but also in Libya, Niger and Sudan....
. At the center of the state was the royal family, a Sultan (in Hausa
Hausa language
Hausa is the Chadic language with the largest number of speakers, spoken as a first language by about 25 million people, and as a second language by about 18 million more, an approximate total of 43 million people...
the Sarkin Damagaram) with many wives (an estimated 300 wives by visitor Heinrich Barth in 1851) and children, and a tradition of direct (to son or brother) succession which reached 26 rulers by 1906. The sultan ruled through the activities of two primary officers the: Ciroma (Military commander and prime minister) his heir-apparent the Yakudima. By the end of the 19th century, Damagaram could field an army of 5,000 cavalry, 30,000 foot soldiers, and a dozen cannons, which they produced in Zinder. Damagaram could also call upon forces of the allied Kel Gres
Kel Gres
The Kel Gress are a Toureg confederation of clans who in the modern era have mostly lived in south central Niger, though who have a history of occupation of the Air Mountains prior to the 17th century...
Tuareg who formed communities near Zinder and other parts of the sultanate.
French conquest
When the French arrived in force in the 1890s, Zinder was the only city of over 10,000 in what is today Niger. Damagaram found itself threatened by well armed European incursions to the west, and the conquering forces of RabahRabah
Rabah is a Local Government Area in Sokoto State, Nigeria. Its headquarters are in the town of Rabah.It has an area of 2,433 km² and a population of 149,165 at the 2006 census.The postal code of the area is 842....
to the east and south. In 1898, A French force under Captain Marius Gabriel Cazemajou spent three weeks under the Sultan's protection in Damagaram. Cazemajou had been dispatched to form an alliance against the British with Rabah, and the Sultan's court were alarmed at the prospect of their two most powerful new threats linking up. Cazemajou was murdered by a faction at the court, and the remainder of the French escaped, protected by other factions. In 1899, the reconstituted elements of the ill fated Voulet-Chanoine Mission
Voulet-Chanoine Mission
The Voulet–Chanoine Mission or Central African Mission was a French military expedition sent out from Senegal in 1898 to conquer the Chad Basin and unify all French territories in West Africa...
finally arrived in Damagaram on its way to revenge Cazemajou's death. Meeting on 30 July at the Battle of Tirmini, 10 km from Zinder, the well armed Senegalese-French troops defeated the Sultan and took Damagaram's capital.
With colonialism, came the loss of some of Damagaram's traditional lands and its most important trade partner to the British in Nigeria
Nigeria
Nigeria , officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a federal constitutional republic comprising 36 states and its Federal Capital Territory, Abuja. The country is located in West Africa and shares land borders with the Republic of Benin in the west, Chad and Cameroon in the east, and Niger in...
.
The French placed the capitol of the new Niger Military Territory there in 1911. In 1926, following fears of Hausa revolts and improving relations with the Djerma
Djerma
The Zarma people , are a people of westernmost Niger and adjacent areas of Burkina Faso, Benin, Ghana and Nigeria. The Zarma language is one of the Songhai languages, a branch of the Nilo-Saharan language family...
of the west, the capitol was transferred back to the village of Niamey
Niamey
-Population:While Niamey's population has grown steadily since independence, the droughts of the early 1970s and 1980s, along with the economic crisis of the early 1980s, have propelled an exodus of rural inhabitants to Niger's largest city...
.
The brother of Sultan Ahmadou mai Roumji had earlier sided with the French, and was placed on the throne in 1899 as Sultan Ahamadou dan Bassa. Following French intelligence that a rising by Hausa in area were preparing a revolt with the aid of the Sultan, a puppet Sultan was placed in power in 1906, though the royal line was restored in 1923. The Sultanate continues to operate in a ceremonial function into the 21st century.
Sultans of Damagaram
- Mallam 1731–46
- Baba dan Mallam 1746–57
- Tanimoun Babani 1757–75
- Assafa dan Tanimoun 1775–82
- Abaza dan Tanimoun 1782–87
- Mallam Babou Saba 1787–90
- Daouda dan Tanimoun 1790–99
- Ahmadou dan Tanimoun 1799–1812
- Sulayman 1812–22
- Ibrahim 1843–51